Trujillo/Huanchaco
Turns out Trujillo is an urban, dirty city. Not to worry though because for about thirty cents you can take a bus out to a little tourist beach town named Huanchaco just a few kilometers away. The best thing about Huanchaco was that they served Peruvian food and not Ecuadorian food! Obviously, we were not suprised by this fact, just really, really happy because Peruvian food is significantly better than Ecuadorian food.. like they aren´t even on the same scale. Our favorite Peruvian food is called lomo saltado, which is basically a beef stir-fry served over rice and french fries. They also have great ceviche and grilled chicken and other strange dishes and it usually costs between $1-$5 for a full meal!
Sunsets on the beach!
The native people use these really cool canoes made of reeds to go fishing. I am pretty sure this tradition dates back to before Incan times.
More sunsets!
We pretty much just messed around and rested for 3 days, but it was really nice.
Keegan had his first Pisco Sour, a mixed drink native to Chile and Peru. It is made of pisco (a grape based liquor), egg whites, lime and other magic delicious ingredients.
Before.
During.
After!
The only other thing we did in Huanchaco was to visit the pre-Incan ruins of Chan Chan. Apparently it is among the largest remaining adobe ruins in the world. We didn´t feel like springing for a guide, so I can´t tell you much more than that. It checks out though, the ruins spread for 6 square kilometers!
Huaraz
After 3 days we figured it was time to move on, but we didn´t have a plan. We met a group of travelers (2 girls from University of Washington, a guy from Vail and a guy from Canada) who convinced us to go to the nearby town of Huaraz with them. We hopped on a night bus and arrived the next morning. We found a really cheap hostel and a pretty cheap tour to take us the next day on a hike out into the national park. Huaraz is apparently known as the Alps or the Switzerland of Latin America. It definitely did not disappoint.
The goal of the hike was to reach a high mountain lake called Laguna 69. The hike started at 12,800ft and ended over 15,000ft. Keegan took 1000 photos so I´ll let them do the talking.
Not the Laguna! Just a lake we stopped by on the way.
It was cold! But I got this awesome Marmot knock-off jacket for $20 at a market in Huaraz (Keegan´s is knock-off Colombia. We know they are knock-offs because the zipper on Keegan´s men´s jacket says "LOVE". But they are waterproof, warm and cheap so we don´t care.)
There are lots of glaciers on the tops of the mountains, so down below there were lots of neat rivers and waterfalls.
And lots of cows.
Not the lake either, but we were about 45 minutes away still and we kind of wished it was the lake.
As we got closer, we got into the glaciers.
First peak at the lake!
It was SO beautiful and blue. We were the first people to the top by about 20-30 minutes so we had it to ourselves! In the middle of the picture is a big waterfall running down from the glaciers.
Another cool thing was that every 5 minutes or so you could hear the glaciers cracking. Makes you feel pretty small thinking about those enormous glaciers!
We had avocado sandwiches and cookies for lunch
We were hot from hiking at first, but right after this picture we threw on every warm thing we had brought.
The hike was amazing and beautiful and a great work out. That night we jumped on a night bus to Lima. Since we have a layover for a few days in Lima at the end of the trip, we decided not to stay. We immediately hopped on a day bus bound for the town of Ica in south/central Peru. Lots of busing! We forgot to account for the fact that the southern part of the continent is huge so I think long bus rides are going to start being the norm unfortunately.
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